Scottish Standard

The "Scottish Standard" was a weekly Scottish newspaper, supportive of Scottish independence. It was launched on March 9 2005; seven issues were published in all.

The intention of the paper was to provide a middle-market tabloid for the section of the Scottish public that support independence. Alex Salmond, leader of the Scottish National Party, wrote a column for the paper, as did other Scottish political figures supportive of independence, including Colin Fox of the Scottish Socialist Party.

It was published in Paisley. It was edited by Alex MacLeod and financed by the Belfast-based Flagship Media Group.

The paper had a modest circulation of between 6000 and 12,000 copies, which was too low to sustain the journalists, sales and administration staff who at launch totalled approximately thirty eight.

The failure of the title may have been due to its lack of any real promotion; the only notable attempt was a ten second advert on Scottish Television and Grampian Television the night before the paper launched. Equally, if not more so, it suffered from distribution problems, with RS McColl being one of the few larger chains to carry it.

ee also

*List of newspapers in Scotland

External links

*cite news | title=Setting a new Standard in newspaper market | date=27 February 2005 | publisher=The Scotsman | url=http://business.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=165&id=218852005
*cite news | title=Scottish Standard newspaper folds | date= April 25 2005 | publisher=BBC News Online | url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/4483449.stm
*cite news | title=An Obituary for the Scottish Standard | date= May 3 2005 | publisher=allmediascotland.com | url=http://www.allmediascotland.com/ams/displayCOMMENTSreply.asp?ID=30